EVOLUTION OF THE FOOTBALL WORLD
Have you ever wonder how soccer / football games get into our life?
When and where is the origin of this game from? Why is it so many
peoples in the world crazy about this game? Almost every culture has
reference to the history of soccer.
The origin of football / soccer can be found in every corner of
geography and history. The Chinese, Japanese, Italian,
Ancient Greek, Persian, Viking, and many more played a
ball game long before our era. The Chinese played
"football" games date as far back as 3000 years ago. The
Ancient Greeks and the Roman used football games to sharpen
warriors for battle. In south and Central America a game called
"Tlatchi" once flourished.
But it was in England that soccer / football really begin to take
shape. It all started in 1863 in England, when two football association
(association football and rugby football) split off on their different
course. Therefore, the first Football Association was founded in
England.
On October 1963, eleven London clubs and schools sent their
representatives to the Freemason's Tavern. These representatives
were intent on clarifying the muddle by establishing a set of
fundamental rules, acceptable to all parties, to
govern the matches played amongst them. This
meeting marked the birth of The Football
Association. The eternal dispute concerning shin-
kicking, tripping and carrying the ball was discussed
thoroughly at this and consecutive meetings until
eventually on 8 December the die-hard exponents of the Rugby style
took their final leave. They were in the minority anyway. They
wanted no part in a game that forbade tripping, shin-kicking and
carrying the ball. A stage had been reached where the ideals were no
longer compatible. On 8 December 1863, football and rugby finally
split. Their separation became totally irreconcilable six
years hence when a provision was included in the football
rules forbidding any handling of the ball (not only carrying
it).
Only eight years after its foundation, The Football
Association already had 50 member clubs. The first football
competition in the world was started in the same year - the FA Cup,
which preceded the League Championship by 17 years.
International matches were being staged in Great Britain before
football had hardly been heard of in Europe. The first was played in
1872 and was contested by England and Scotland. This sudden boom
of organized football accompanied by staggering crowds of
spectators brought with it certain problems with which other
countries were not confronted until much later on. Professionalism
was one of them. The first moves in this direction came in 1879,
when Darwin, a small Lancashire club, twice managed to draw
against the supposedly invincible Old Etonians in the FA Cup, before
the famous team of London amateurs finally scraped through to win
at the third attempt. Two Darwin players, the Scots John Love and
Fergus Suter, are reported as being the first players ever to receive
remuneration for their football talent. This practice grew rapidly and
the Football Association found itself obliged to legalise
professionalism as early as 1885. This development predated the
formation of any national association outside of Great Britain
(namely, in the Netherlands and Denmark) by exactly four years.
After the English Football Association, the next oldest are the
Scottish FA (1873), the FA of Wales (1875) and the Irish FA (1880).
Strictly speaking, at the time of the first international match, England
had no other partner association against which to play. When
Scotland played England in Glasgow on 30 November 1872, the
Scottish FA did not even exist - it was not founded for another three
months. The team England played that day was actually the oldest
Scottish club team, Queen's Park.
The spread of football outside of England, mainly due to the British
influence abroad, started slow, but it soon gathered momentum and
spread rapidly to all parts of the world. The next countries to form
football associations after the Netherlands and Denmark in 1889
were New Zealand (1891), Argentina (1893), Chile (1895),
Switzerland, Belgium (1895), Italy (1898), Germany, Uruguay (both in
1900), Hungary (1901) and Finland (1907). When FIFA was founded
in Paris in May 1904 it had seven founder members: France, Belgium,
Denmark, the Netherlands, Spain (represented by the Madrid FC),
Sweden and Switzerland. The German Football Federation cabled its
intention to join on the same day.
This international football community grew steadily,
although it sometimes met with obstacles and setbacks. In
1912, 21 national associations were already affiliated to the
Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA). By
1925, the number had increased to 36, in 1930 - the year of
the first World Cup - it was 41, in 1938, 51 and in 1950, after
the interval caused by the Second World War, the number
had reached 73. At present, after the 2000 Ordinary FIFA Congress,
FIFA has 204 members in every part of the world.
